A Yoda Cameo Was Cut From ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’

Though Star Wars: The Force Awakens takes place over 30 years after the events of Return of the Jedi, director J.J. Abrams still found a way to work on some classic characters who had long since passed on. Kylo Ren has a conversation with Darth Vader’s helmet. Obi-Wan speaks to Rey during her Force vision. And, there was one additional cameo that ultimately was cut from the film: Yoda.

The Force Awakens editor Maryann Brandon spoke to Entertainment Tonight at the American Cinema Editors awards and said:

There was one point where we were actually thinking of having Yoda in the film, and then we decided not to. Frank Oz came in for a day and did a whole bunch of Yoda and he was over the moon to do it — and we were tickled pink!

It’s interesting to note that they didn’t just conceptually think about a Yoda appearance, but the plans had gotten far enough along that Oz was actually brought in to complete voiceover work. Not entirely surprising considering that The Force Awakens script was constantly in flux and Abrams reportedly cut over 30 minutes of footage for the theatrical release. So, what part was Yoda going to play in the movie?

Since Yoda is dead (spoiler alert?), Yoda was reportedly going to appear to Luke as a Force Ghost speaking to Rey. There were early rumors that Yoda would have a dialogue with Luke in the film, but given what we know about Abrams’ and Lawrence Kasdan’s rewrite of the original Michael Arndt script, Luke was never enough of a presence to have any conversation with anyone other than Rey. He always just appeared at the end of the film, because, as Arndt put it, “It just felt like every time Luke came in and entered the movie, he just took it over. Suddenly you didn’t care about your main character anymore because, ‘Oh f–k, Luke Skywalker’s here. I want to see what he’s going to do.’”

However Yoda was set to appear in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, we hope that it’s part of the upcoming Blu-ray set that Abrams has already confirmed will include multiple deleted scenes from the film.